Eco Friendly Workplace Handouts

The Emerald Office: Eco-Friendly Workforce Strategies Kendall College May 18, 2009

Kyra Cavanaugh
President, Life Meets Work --a consultancy and online community that helps organizations drive bottom line results by implementing and optimizing flexible workforce strategies.
Flexible worker for last 10 years (telecommuting, part-time, contract, compressed work weeks).
Currently manages a virtual team.
Career in consumer packaged goods for nearly 20 years: Quaker, Keebler, Dominick’s Finer Foods, Willard Bishop Consulting
Member of Workplace Excellence Committee, Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, and spearheading flexible workforce project with the Women’s Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor.
Speaker at upcoming 2009 Illinois State SHRM Conference and recently honored as a finalist in the AWLP Work-Life Rising Star awards.
©Life Meets Work, 2009

Goals for this workshop
My goal:
To demonstrate how flexible workforce strategies support green and corporate sustainability goals
To discuss practical ways to implement and optimize flex work programs
What is your goal for today?

Going Green & Corporate Sustainability
Green:
Reduce consumption
Reduce environmental footprint
Make better choices
Corporate Sustainability:
Goes beyond environmental to social and governance policies
Short term earnings gains aren’t enough, must act in ways that benefit the community, shareholders, employees and the environment for long term survival
Outperformed the stock market average by 25% from 2005-2007.*
72% outperformed their peers during the same period.*
©Life Meets Work, 2009 *Goldman Sachs, 2007

Alternative Workforce Strategies
Alternative Workforce Strategies (AWS) = Flexible Work
Part-time
Condensed workweeks
Teleworking
Alternative Shift Scheduling
Flex start and end times
Summer hours
Job sharing

Impact of alternative workforce strategies
AWS significantly impacts the environment:
Telecommuting reduces:
CO2 emissions
Reduction of 2 metric tons/worker/yr*
50 million teleworkers could save 100M metric tons**
Fossil fuel consumption
Reduction in daily vehicle traffic by 53-77%***
Avg teleworker saves $870/yr on gas*
50 million teleworkers could save 587M barrels of oil**
Use of commercial real estate
©Life Meets Work, 2009 *Sun Microsystems, 2008 **Study by Undress4success.com ***ITIF, 2009

Telecommuting reduces:
Automobile replacement cycle
Avg teleworker saves $906/yr in car wear and tear*
Traffic congestion
Enables more efficient trucking system which lowers emissions and delivery costs
“ Reduced travel” policies:
Virtual Meetings-teleconferencing/webconferencing
Worldwide reduction of more than 3B tons of CO2 emissions could be result of virtual meetings and telework alone by 2050***
©Life Meets Work, 2009 *Sun Microsystems, 2008 ***WWF, 2009

Less commercial real estate reduces:
Raw materials (lumber, metals, etc)
Energy consumption:
Savings of 5400 kwh/year for someone working 2.1 days from home
Water consumption
CO2 emissions
Waste

Case Studies
State of Utah
Implemented a four-day workweek in Summer, 2008
Cut energy use by 13% across 900 govt office buildings
Now energy specialists are looking for inefficiencies to save more
Challenge: how to turn massive HVAC systems off on Fridays
Fairfax, Virginia
Increased to 20% of Fairfax public employees using AWS and reduced traffic in the county by 6%
Microsoft
Reduced business travel by 10% per employee in 2008
Saved $92M and 17,000 metric tons of CO2

Sun Microsystems’ Open Work program
14 year old program
Over 56% of workforce works away at least 2 days/wk
Reduced real estate holdings 15% in 2007
Saves over $70M/yr in real estate costs,
Reduced 31,000 tons of greenhouse gases (23%) between 2002-2007
Wants to reduce another 20% by 2015
60% of time spent commuting is now given back in the form of work
Telecommuters score higher on performance ratings than onsite peers
85% of employees would recommend Sun as an employer
Case Studies ©Life Meets Work, 2009

AWS sustains corporate performance
Ten ways:
Increased productivity
Increased customer satisfaction/retention and service levels
Increased employee retention/engagement
Reduced absenteeism rates
“ Employer of Choice” recruitment and retention strategy
Employees closer to customer locations
Disability accommodation
Supports work/life initiatives
Business continuity/disaster planning
Supports community by offering flexibility for working caregivers

AWS sustains corporate performance
60% of teleworkers are less likely to look for another job.
--2008 Clean Air Campaign study
87% of employees and managers agreed telecommuters’ productivity improved or stayed the same.
--2008 Study by National Science Foundation
Teleworkers were more engaged and had more favorable opinions of senior management.
--2008 study of 10,000 workers by Kenexa Research Institute

Challenges
Getting management buy-in
Both C-suite and middle management
Training managers
Skills are the same for flex or onsite teams, but requires training to improve
Changing tradition
Managers learned to manage this way and resist change
Adapting to performance management
It’s about “what” work gets done, not “how” it gets done
Investing in technology and training
Not all employees are tech-savvy
Systems and infrastructure may require investment

Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.
George S. Patton

Setting up a flexible work team
Two ways to do it:
Approach A:
Create a proposal and offers flexible work options to eligible team members.
Offer a pilot program for 3 to 6 months with an evaluation, and option for ongoing arrangement.
Approach B:
Allow entire organization, department, team to work flexibly.
Team establishes and agrees to rules and
signs a Virtual Work Agreement that is reviewed and renewed every six months.

Managing a flexible work team
Key Components:
Execute a Virtual Teams Agreement
Realize management style influences outcome
Create a sense of place
Communicate deliberately
Set goals and track performance
Choose the right people

Offer for today’s attendees
Flexible work consultation
Drop your card with Kyra after the event today.
Schedule free one-hour phone consultation with Kyra Cavanaugh, Flexible Workplace Expert and President of Life Meets Work by June 1, 2009
We'll discuss your workforce challenges and opportunities, the current state of your flex work program, or your interest in starting one.
At the end, you'll walk away with at least three pieces of actionable advice and no further obligation.
Just call 888-462-5691 or email [email_address]

Research
From Workplace to Anyplace , WWF with a grant from Microsoft Corporation, 2009 http://www.worldwildlife.org/who/media/press/2009/WWFBinaryitem11939.pdf
Improving Quality of Life Through Telecommuting, ITIF, 2009
http://www.itif.org/files/Telecommuting.pdf
A New Mindset for Corporate Sustainability , 2007
http://www.biggerthinking.com/docs/en/a_new_mindset_white_paper.pdf

Additional Resources
Co-working sites:
See list at blog.coworking.info
Regus-individual and corporate subscriptions
For more information about virtual teams:
lifemeetswork.com
telework.gov
teleworkexchange.com
Resources from Sun Microsystems
www.sun.com/aboutsun/openwork/
http://www.sun.com/aboutsun/openwork/managing_virtual_world.pdf

Contact Us
Kyra Cavanaugh
President, Life Meets Work
lifemeetswork.com
888-462-5691
[email_address]

Eco Friendly Workplace Handouts

by Kyra Cavanaugh on Jul 30, 2009

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